Friday, November 20, 2015

Friday Finish: Cherry Baby

I can't even remember when I started making this quilt. It was at our yearly quilt retreat in the mountains at the end of February, but I can't remember the year--probably at least five years ago.
This is what I do remember. The pattern is by Carrie Nelson of Miss Rosie's Quilt Company, and the fabric is by Holly Holderman of Lakehouse Dry Goods.

It is a perfect combination. Most of the fabric has very subtle metallic accents that are just beautiful, but don't photograph well.The blocks are large enough to really show off the fabric.
I wanted to use the pink check fabric on the bias for the binding but didn't have enough. I did have a coordinating alphabet panel that I couldn't figure out what to do with, so I ended up cutting it into strips for the binding. That gave me a mostly white binding with little pops of color every so often. You can also see the pretty fabric used for the backing--blue with little cherries all over.
The size is 64" x 64" and was beautifully quilted by Darby. It will go up for charity auction next April.

I can't resist sharing a couple more pictures.

I'm linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts, TGIFF, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, and Ft. Worth Fabric Company. Have a lovely weekend.

Thursday, November 19, 2015

Really Random Thursday: 11/19/15

Have you read the book by Marie Kondo, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up?

I have begun tidying up and I'm starting to feel the magic, although at this point, mostly what I feel is dry hands and sore muscles.

I think by the time I'm through, I will have touched every item and piece of paper we own. I'll spare you the gory details, and just show you some of the things I have found. 

The pictures taken during years of our marriage (42+) have been condensed into about four photo boxes. Although there is a whole decade of images on my computer, but that's a task for another day year. Some of you will remember the days when we took our chances with the photos on the film in our camera. So every picture was developed, usually in doubles. I used to save nearly every picture, good, bad, fuzzy or otherwise. I have been ruthless this week. For the most part, I don't feel the need to save scenery pictures. A few representative pictures of events have been saved, as long as there are friends or family included in the picture. Along the way I found some gems.

Some made me laugh.

This is my friend, Dotty. She taught me to quilt. This is the mascot of our local triple A baseball team. I think we were in a skybox for the game and the mascot dropped by... I sent this picture to Dotty. She claims to not know the person in this picture. Ha!
Pictures of very good friends, Jessie and Val, and Val's now-husband, Matt. These pictures brought back memories and such a good laugh. Those are my red boots, by the way. 
And a bit of sadness. Here is Sue, such a dear friend, mother of Jessie and Val, no longer with us. She is holding Charlotte (who is now 9) in that bottom picture.
One of my favorite pictures ever. Our son, Aaron (now 37), with my grandfather.
If you are old enough to remember Toni hair permanents, you might vaguely remember that every year, the company chose a set of twins, the first ones born in the new year. So my cousins, Gwen and Beth, were the Toni twins of 1953. Their parents received lots of gifts from the company that year. 
Gwen, Beth and their sister Sandy
I found some professional photos of the fused glass Mark used to make.
 A "Glassy Quilt"--Mark made the frame and I made a 3" mini quilt and did a bit of beading.
Mark also made custom dinnerware. So beautiful....
We used to be vendors at quilt shows, and this sign was on the door of a hotel gift shop. Weird hours. Why not just say 7 a.m. to 11 p.m.?
When Aaron was going to optometry school in the Portland area, and he and Christa were expecting Charlotte, they posted a picture every day as the countdown to the due date grew closer. So if you are reading this and live in the Portland area, you might recognize some of these signs.
My friend, Jennifer, makes little personalized signs each year when we attend the quilting retreat sponsored by our local quilt shop. I'm missing one year. But I know I'll find it when I tackle the sewing room. The quilt shop gives us each 1/2 yard of focus fabric to make a project and Jennifer always adds a strip of that fabric to the card. It's a fun added touch.

You can tell that 2009 was the year Twilight was popular and everyone was trying to figure out which character they were. 

The year Jennifer was taking Spanish lessons and so our signs were in Spanish
And I found this cross stitch pattern. I think we all have this kind of day once in awhile.
So do you hang on to things? Or do you find joy in decluttering?

Friday, November 13, 2015

Friday Finish: Pop Beads

I started this quilt a long time ago. According to some photos I uploaded to Flickr, it was in February 2011. It is made entirely of my precious collection of original Flea Market Fancy fabric and Kona snow for the background.
It was based on a quilt by Mary Hickey called Mama's Pop Beads, which she made based on a vintage quilt. Mary's quilt was very scrappy and had a "piano keys" border. So I figured out a way to simplify the block and make it out of a single fabric plus the background.

I had originally planned on posting a free tutorial on how to make the quilt block, after receiving several requests for the information. Then after the whole top was sewn together, I happened to notice a magazine in my local quilt shop with a very similar quilt on the cover. It turned out to be "Chain of Fools" by Jen Kingwell. At that point I was not familiar with Jen (which shows you just how long ago that was!), but still, even though quilt was totally based on Mary Hickey's quilt, it felt awkward to post the tutorial. So the quilt top languished in a pile for the next several years.

In spring I decided that it needed to be completed. My block construction is different from either Mary's or Jen's, so if there is any interest, I will post the tutorial.
I love this quilt so very much.
Darby quilted it with one of my favorite designs.
And of course, since it is made entirely of original FMF, it felt like the obvious choice to use more Denyse Schmidt fabric on the back.
And the binding too.
Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts, TGIFF, Fort Worth Fabric Studio, and Confessions of a Fabric Addict. Happy weekend, everyone.

Friday, November 6, 2015

Friday Finish: Texas A&M

I started this quilt three years ago for my brother's daughter, Liz, who was a student at Texas A&M. I had planned it for her graduation. She graduated over two years ago. Hmmm. How I wish procrastination wasn't such an issue with me.

The Aggies fabric came from the Fat Quarter Shop and the rest came from my stash.

Oh, except the backing fabric, which is a favorite. The colors are just perfect to coordinate with the sports fabric on the front but adds a nice girly touch.
Isn't it awesome?
 Darby surprised me by quilting the logo several times--she is the best!

It's on its way to Dallas. I really hope Liz likes it. (We don't see her nearly often enough so I hope she doesn't mind that I grabbed this picture off her Instagram feed--isn't she beautiful?)
I'm linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts, TGIFF and Confessions of a Fabric Addict.